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A CurtainUp 
London Review
London ReviewThe Same Deep Water As Me
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"We find 'em, we follow 'em, we prang 'em."
— Kevin
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Foreground Marc Wootton as Kevin Needleman and to the rear Daniels Mays as Andrew Eagleman (Photo: Johan Persson) |
Kevin (Marc Wootton) and Andrew (Daniel Mays) know each other from School. Andrew is in partnership with the respectable Barry Patterson (Nigel Lindsay), a firm called Scorpion Claims, "Luton's finest personal injuries lawyers". Kevin is short of money and with a baby on the way, he is claiming for an accident that he wasn't involved in with passengers who weren't there.
Much of The Same Deep Water As Me is quick fire comedy with great one-liners based around these low lives planning a white collar crime in a seedy office where the more honest Barry offers clients exotic herbal and green teas and everyone nips over to Greggs, a cheap bakery chain. The first act is a succession of their client base and the second set in the court room where the supermarket owned van driver challenges the claimant's version of events with their own ball-breaking solicitor, Georgina (the wonderful Monica Dolan).
Daniel Mays has a face made for comedy when Andrew's dodgy friend, Kevin, lands him in deeper and deeper water. What starts for Andrew as a small lie spirals into major fraud and on a large scale. Marc Wootton makes your flesh creep as Kevin the scamster. The characterisations in Nick Payne's comedy are plausible and the performances John Crowley gets from his cast, superb. In the first act Monica is a tale telling taxi driver in the "You'll never guess who I had in the back of my cab . . ." mould, and unrecognisable in the second, as the slick suited lawyer. "With a veritable smorgasbord of head and neck injuries", she says implying the pick and choose nature of the claim. What is less believable is that any judge would not see straight through Kevin's implausible lies. We do enjoy the judge (Peter Forbes) going apeshit, not at the lies he's been told, but when he catches Kevin texting on his mobile phone in court. This illustrates a judicial system not delivering justice.
Scott Pask's office set is full of cluttered detritus and the rif about the fan that doesn't work makes a journey to the court room to cool off the judge, where it perfectly cools him alone.
Expectations are high from Nick Payne whose play Constellations won some of last year's Best New Play awards, but The Same Deep Water As Me is like a pilot for a television series with his marvellous ear for dialogue rather than fine plot construction. However, well done to Nick Payne for exposing and putting centre stage the fake accident industry which has put hundreds of pounds on our car insurance premiums.
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| The Same Deep Water As Me
Written by Nick Payne Directed by John Crowley Starring: Daniel Mays, Nigel Lindsay, Monica Dolan, Marc Wootton With: Peter Forbes, Joanna Griffin, Niky Wardley, Isabella Laughland Designed by Scott Pask Lighting: Peter Mumford Sound: Christopher Shutt Running time: Two hours 5 minutes with one interval Box Office: 0844 871 7624 Booking to 28th September 2013 Reviewed by Lizzie Loveridge based on 6th August 2013 performance at the Donmar Warehouse, 41 Earlham Street, London WC2H 9LX (Tube: Covent Garden) |
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